Page 21 of Fortune Favors the Frivolous (Matchmaking Mischief Makers #2)

“If I’d known your aunt was staying at the same inn as Mr. Gascoyne and myself, we could have arranged to have shared a saddle of beef downstairs in a private chamber rather than have ours in our chamber, as Mr. Gascoyne did not care for the idea of descending the stairs when, to be quite truthful, we were not entirely sure of the reputation of this lodging house.

But for the necessity of changing horses and the late hour, we’d have continued to Marbury, where we know there is a very respectable inn.

Of course, with your aunt under this same roof, our fears in that quarter are now put quite to rest. Now, I shall knock just a little loudly, for it is not too early that your Aunt Pike shouldn’t be awake if not up already. ”

Mrs. Gascoyne rapped sharply on the door.

Bracing herself for the inevitable silence, Venetia stared stony-faced at the wooden floor, then at Mrs. Gascoyne, for she could not give up so easily when it was possible the woman could be reasonable. Though the set of the older woman’s jaw suggested otherwise.

“She is sleeping, I am sure of it.” Venetia gave an exaggerated sigh, twisting her hands in the folds of her dress.

“Poor Aunt Pike. Her megrim must have been worse than I thought. And to think I have been downstairs all this time talking to you when I should have been attending to my dear aunt with cold compresses and soothing possets.” Lordy, Venetia couldn’t count the number of hours she’d had to do just that.

“I am worried.” Mrs. Gascoyne frowned. “Deeply worried, as you should be, young lady! Yes, you must go in and ensure that she is not expired as we speak!” Her voice trembled.

“And I shall follow you with the necessary fortitude should it be needed. Rarely a more uncomplaining, stouter woman than your Aunt Pike could be imagined. Open that door, my girl, and we will ensure that your poor aunt is still on this mortal earth.”

Well, there was nothing for it, really, Venetia thought, adopting a phrase that Henry would have used; closing her eyes as she turned the door handle, almost willing her deplorable aunt to be lying, eyes closed and feverish upon the bed.

But, of course, she was not. The room was bare, the bed slightly crumpled with no other evidence of habitation—other than the fact that Venetia and Henry had emerged from it earlier… together and alone.

Damning, damning! Even though nothing untoward had occurred.

But of course, Mrs. Gascoyne, and people like her with fevered imaginations, always thought the worst, Venetia knew. She’d lived with “people like that” since she’d been eight years old and her aunt had taken her in.

In the gloom, Mrs. Gascoyne looked like a blind baby bird as she peered about, stretching out the silence, her frown growing deeper as she seemed to think she really might find Aunt Pike beneath the bed. She even bent to check, her stiff skirts rustling as she stooped.

Finally, turning with great deliberation towards Venetia, she said heavily, “Your Aunt Pike is not at this inn, is she, Miss Playford?”

Venetia shook her head, her stomach sinking with dread. The game was up.

“You and that young man emerged from this chamber… alone… before he… abandoned you.” Each pause in Mrs. Gascoyne’s speech felt weighted with judgment.

Just as Venetia had expected to have the woman’s deep disapproval and disappointment unleashed upon her, Mrs. Gascoyne’s severe frown suddenly crumpled and she put her hand on Venetia’s shoulder, gripping it fiercely as she said, “That young man shall not succeed in ruining an innocent young girl like you if I have any say in it.”

“Please, Mrs. Gascoyne, nothing happened. I promise—” Venetia’s voice rose with desperation.

“But you were alone in a bedchamber with him, hours from London, alone and unchaperoned,” the woman went on, her fingers digging painfully into Venetia’s flesh. “Correct me if I’m wrong, but those are the facts of the matter—is that not correct?”

“Yes, but Mrs. Gascoyne, it was not my fault. I was… taken against my will.” Venetia swallowed hard, trying to organize her thoughts into a coherent explanation.

“He abducted you!” Mrs. Gascoyne’s wizened face took on a horrified quality, her eyes widening until the whites showed all around.

“No, not Henry—” Venetia tried to interject, but Mrs. Gascoyne was not listening.

“Henry, is it? Got you cozy with Christian-naming so he could spirit you off to the country. Did you not suspect his evil intentions? Did your aunt not warn you—” Spittle gathered at the corners of her mouth as her indignation mounted.

“Henry rescued me. He didn’t abduct me. No, that was—” Venetia’s words tumbled over each other in her haste to explain.

“Did you sleep in that bed?” Mrs. Gascoyne stabbed her finger towards the offending object by the window, which clearly had been slept in, the sheets rumpled and bearing the indentation of two bodies.

“I slept, but… that is all. I slept because I’d been in a carriage all night and I was frightened and exhausted, and then Henry came—” Tears stung Venetia’s eyelids.

“And your Henry will atone! Mr. Gascoyne!” Barking an order that carried into the passage where her husband had just appeared through the open door on his way to presumably their own chamber, Mrs. Gascoyne made it clear that escape was not an option. Her thin chest heaved with righteous fervor.

“Please, Mrs. Gascoyne, that is not at all the way matters were,” Venetia protested, close to tears. But it seemed Mrs. Gascoyne had fashioned herself into Venetia’s savior rather than critic, her narrow face alight with the pleasure of moral vindication.

“The poor dear girl has been hoodwinked by a libertine,” she hissed as her husband entered the room, closing the door behind him at her command.

“I haven’t,” said Venetia. “Not by Henry. Of course I was by Lord—”

“And now the young man has abandoned her. He is not here, is he? He’s left you, my dear Miss Playford, having spent the night in this room with you while pretending upon departure that he was a man of honor.

” Her eyes nearly bulged out of her head as she said it, her voice dropping to a scandalized whisper.

“Oh, Mr. Gascoyne—” she gripped his arm, her lips pursed, “—that young man will have to do the right thing. Wherever he is, we will find him before any of this comes to light. It’s the least I can do for my dear friend, Mrs. Pike, who is probably sick with worry about your whereabouts. ”

“No, she’s not sick with worry.” Venetia opened her mouth to say that her evil aunt had in fact facilitated the means by which Lord Windermere had kidnapped her, but Mrs. Gascoyne spoke over her as she entreated her husband.

“You will speak to him, Mr. Gascoyne. Oh yes, you will tell that young man that if he is not to be pilloried, and his name blackened and every institution set against him—because you have power in high places, indeed you do—he will do the honorable thing and marry this poor innocent. This poor young lady who had no idea what was happening when he insinuated he’d be a gentleman and then fell so far short. ”

Mr. Gascoyne’s eyes narrowed further with each of his wife’s pronouncements and his jowls quivered with indignation. “If that young man I saw earlier has indeed been guilty of what you say he is, my dear, then I shall leave no stone unturned before I find him.”

Mrs. Gascoyne clenched her bird-like hands into fists as she turned back to Venetia.

“Your secret is safe with me, my dear. But of course, your fate depends upon us running this scoundrel to ground. If it is the last thing I do, it’s to honor my friendship to your poor dear aunt, by ensuring your virtue is protected at all costs.

Mark my words, when Mr. Gascoyne sets his mind to it, he can do anything.

And finding Mr. Henry Ashworth is what he will do. ”

Her bosom heaved, and she looked fiercely at Venetia as if expecting gratitude, her thin nostrils flaring with each breath.

Venetia didn’t know how to respond. She only knew that if being kidnapped by Lord Windermere had seemed the worst that could happen to her twenty-four hours earlier, this was a close second.

And then hurried footsteps sounded up the stairs in the distance, coming closer as they traversed the corridor, while Henry’s cheerful voice called out as he opened the door to step into the room.

“Venetia! I’m back! And you’ll never guess who I’ve brought with me!”

Venetia thought she would expire on the spot as she watched Henry’s cheerful expression melt away while Caroline, dressed in some strange, colorful garb, appeared at his shoulder.

Then Mrs. Gascoyne drew herself up to her full, albeit modest, height and pointed an accusatory finger at Henry.

“Mr. Ashworth,” she intoned, her voice quivering with righteous indignation, “we have been waiting for you.”

*

“Oh Henry, what will we do?” Caroline burst out as they watched the Gascoyne carriage disappear a short while later. “They talk of rescuing Venetia from evil influences—meaning you—but they’re taking Venetia straight back to her aunt!”

Henry shook his head. Then, squaring his shoulders, he took her hand and squeezed it.

Not with loving tenderness, but with the bolstering energy that reminded Caroline of when they were children.

“We need proof of Lord Windermere’s evil deeds,” he said grimly.

“And we will find it! We will discover why Windermere wishes so dearly to marry penniless Venetia and why her aunt is up to her neck in skullduggery.” Then, with a sigh, and a touch less heroism, he added, “Though, truth be told, I don’t know where we’d begin.

Mrs. Pike is Venetia’s only relative. Her father and mother are dead.

And so is anyone who knew them, it seems.”

Caroline caught her breath. “Oh, Henry! I’ve just remembered. Just before I left home, my maid made mention of Mr. Rothbury, saying she’d been told by another of the servants that Mr. Rothbury’s father had been bailiff to the Playford family. Of course, Mr. Rothbury would have only been a boy—”

“Capital!” With admiration written across his face, Henry dipped his head to kiss Caroline on the lips.

“There has to be something about Venetia that makes Lord Windermere want her, and if Mr. Rothbury can throw any light upon the matter, then we’ve got a start.

You never were one to miss an opportunity, my clever girl.

We made a fearsome duo when we were children.

Imagine how unstoppable we’ll be when we’re married! ”